


At my best, I worry you won't

by Polyhexian



Series: Humanformers: The Music AU [10]
Category: The Transformers (IDW Generation One), Transformers - All Media Types
Genre: AU, Drugs, F/F, Humanformers, POV Third Person
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2021-01-18
Updated: 2021-01-18
Packaged: 2021-03-16 23:13:16
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,272
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/28839072
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Polyhexian/pseuds/Polyhexian
Summary: Whirl gets picked up from jail.
Relationships: Cyclonus/Tailgate (Transformers)
Series: Humanformers: The Music AU [10]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/1859230
Comments: 1
Kudos: 17





	At my best, I worry you won't

It was not Whirl's first time in a jail cell, and with the way her life was going, she doubted it would be the last- unless, of course, she died before she had the chance to get arrested again. That was beginning to look more and more likely as time ticked by. 

She tried not to let her hands shake as she rolled her thumb into the inkpad during processing, but she knew it was obvious. No one questioned it, though. People didn't often press her on details like that. She knew what people saw when they looked at her- exactly what she wanted them to. A worthless junkie burnout dancing in the brink of oblivion. Too beyond saving to be worth the effort.

She had to wait to use the phone. There was a line. So she sat in the furthest corner of the general holding cell she could, and tried to radiate as much _come near me and I will kill you_ energy as she could. She must have done a good job, because no one came near.

She was so fucked.

Whirl had been in a bad way before, but never like this. She didn't think she'd ever been so alone in her life- not like this. She'd been _alone_ before, but before she had started that way. Now she'd _had_ a family, only to lose it- the aloneness of it seemed somehow more powerful, more profound. It threatened to swallow her up and drown her, but the far more real and pressing reality in her gut wouldn't let her think about much else for long. 

She couldn't go home. Impactor _might_ forgive her once he'd cooled down, but until he did, he'd be out for blood. She was on her own, homeless until further notice. She had nowhere to go and nowhere to be, no one left on her side. 

It was only then, as the crushing weight of despair threatened to drag her into oblivion, that she mindlessly patted at her front jacket pocket and heard a crinkle- and then remembered what was there.

Hesitantly, she opened the flap on the pocket and drew out the receipt she'd gotten a few weeks prior, a phone number scribbled across the back, and a name written in fancy, curly letters: 

Tailgate.

She shoved the receipt back in her pocket. This was stupid. She couldn't call someone she slept with months ago and never called back to come bail her out of _jail._

She paced in her corner and her stomach gurgled. She was on borrowed time. She couldn't just _walk_ out of here either, not when she knew someone would come find her eventually…

Somehow, she found herself holding the receipt again when it was her turn to use the phone.

"Hiya! Tailgate here, whaddya need?" Chirped a chipper voice through the speaker. Whirl swallowed thickly.

"Hey," she rasped awkwardly, "Uh… I know it's been awhile."

"Hm? Who's this?"

"Oh- it's, uh. It's Whirl."

"Oh! Whirl! Wow, it's so great to hear from you again, how have you been?"

Whirl leaned forward against the wall next to the phone, sagging into one arm as the anxiety began to catch up to her and she scrunched her eye shut. "Uh- not so great, actually. I'm- I called because- I need to- the truth is that-"

"Are you alright?" Tailgate asked, the genuine concern in her voice so overwhelming something in Whirl finally cracked under the pressure and she hiccuped a brief sob, cutting it off with a sniffle as she rubbed her eye angrily.

"No, it's- I'm sorry, to ask, but I- I don't have anyone else to call, and I'm- I don't know what to do. I'm sorry."

"Where are you? We'll come get you," Tailgate said, her voice firm and filled with something Whirl didn't think she knew how to feel. She sniffled again.

"Uh. Jail. Corner of fourth and Havester. I'm sorry," she repeated.

"Don't be," Tailgate answered immediately, "We'll be right there, Whirl." 

Whirl hung up the phone, sniffling, and let the officer waiting lead her back to the gen cell to wait in her corner and try to pass off her red eyes as a lingering high. 

* * *

Whirl leaned back against the dumpster and tore at the jerky she'd stolen from the gas station with her teeth. There were a lot of pressing concerns that should have been on her mind at the moment, like where she was going to sleep that night, or what was going to happen to her now that she was a homeless middle schooler, or if she might be in danger all on her own in the city. All she could think about, however, was how tough jerky was, and how much she wished she'd stolen something else.

"Hey, buddy, are you okay?" a voice asked. Whirl looked up, startled, only to find an adult squatting down to her eye level, arms leaning on her knees. 

"Fine," Whirl snapped.

"It's pretty late for a little boy to be out all alone," the woman said gently.

"I'm a _girl!_ " Whirl exclaimed, tearing off a chunk of jerky with her teeth, "And I ain't little."

"Oh-" the woman said awkwardly, "I'm so sorry! Do you need any help?"

Whirl rolled her eye and glared at the stranger. "Like I need another hole in the head." 

* * *

Whirl woke up with a gasp and a cold sweat when someone nudged her. It was a stranger, someone who looked like she was sobering up at her own thing pace.

"Hey," said the woman, "They called your name." 

"Shit," Whirl wheezed, and sat up, "Thanks." She stumbled to her feet, the world woozy and hot, and then out of the cell when an officer nodded at her. 

She knew Tailgate had said they were coming, but at the same time, seeing the two of them waiting for her in the front was a shock that made her stomach flip. She really hoped she didn't puke now and get herself killed, all the awkwardness so far would have been pointless. 

"Whirl!" Tailgate cried when she saw her, "You look awful!" 

"That's just how I normally look, squirt," Whirl mumbled halfheartedly, before she took the paperwork the clerk gave her to finish signing. Cyclonus eyed her in silence.

"Thank you," Whirl said as soon as the doors were shut beside them and she had been plunged back into what remained of the quickly fading afternoon sunlight.

"You're welcome," answered Cyclonus, without looking at her. Whirl balled her hands into fists in her jeans. 

"We're parked over here, on the other side," Tailgate said, tugging her gently by the elbow, and it took Whirl a moment to process the sentence before she furrowed her expression.

"Where are we going?" she asked.

"Back to our place," Tailgate said, as if it were obvious, "Unless you have somewhere else to be?"

Another bolt of guilt shot through Whirl like lightning and made her ribs ache. "No. Thank you," she said hoarsely. Tailgate nodded firmly, as if that were that.

She spent an hour and a half in their bathroom and cried the whole time, half because she felt like it, and half to create enough noise mush to hide what she was doing, until she was empty and suddenly had a kilo of cocaine to deal with and nowhere to hide it. Eventually she settled on wrapping everything in a discarded grocery bag she found under the sink and hiding it in the commode of the toilet, carefully moving all the decorative soaps off and back on again as she did.


End file.
